As of two week’s ago Venom writing duties fell to Zombieland co-writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. Now, Variety reports that Gary Ross may not only be writing the Venom screenplay, but directing the film as well.
Ross is responsible for rewriting James Vanderbilt’s Spider-Man 4 script and will get going on Venom as soon as his work on that is completed. Thankfully Ross has no ties to Spider-Man 3 but he does have a history of collaborating with Spidey himself, Tobey Maguire. Ross wrote and directed both Seabiscuit and Pleasantville. On another promising note, Ross co-wrote the screenplay for the fantastic 1988 film Big. The credentials are there, let’s just hope Ross delivers. Not only would it be fantastic to see the Spider-Man film franchise regain its glory, but it’ll also be nice to see the infamous villain Venom emerge from the Spidey 3 muck.
Another element of the film Variety touches upon, which hasn’t really been addressed, is whether or not Topher Grace will reprise his role as Eddie Brock. I’ve got nothing against Grace but am thankful to hear the article note that the film will be approaching the character from scratch and the role will likely be recast.
In the Spider-Man realm, Venom is a liquid-like creature that requires a host. In Spider-Man 3 that host was Eddie Brock, but Brock wasn’t the only character known for being transformed into the super-villain in the comics. There’s also Mac Gargan. Gargan was a private investigator for J. Jonah Jameson who underwent a procedure aiming to give the subject the abilities of a particular animal, in his case, a scorpion. At one point, the Venom symbiote offers Mac new abilities and he transforms from Scorpion into Venom. Hopefully, we’ll see a more narrow focus emerge soon.
